Today I have been a mother for a month. It has taken me a long time to write this post, the post about my birth experience and my transition into motherhood. Most mothers, when recounting their birth, whether completely natural, totally medicated, or surgical, look back fondly on the experience. They will wax nostalgic about the pain and the sweat and the exhaustion, dreamily opining about the magical, miraculous moments when they first met their precious child. My birth experience was somewhat different. It was not magical. It was stark, clinical, and cold. I knew a week in advance what would be happening. My amniotic fluid had simply run out and the baby was simply out of room in my wonky, deformed uterus. We woke up early on a Wednesday morning and checked into the hospital at 5:30am. It was chilly and I was shaking with nerves. I have always hated hospitals, medicine, and most of all, surgery. But surgery--the biggest surgery of my life--was the only way they would
food for the body, nourishment for the soul